Synthetic Biology applications to Water Supply and Remediation

我们计划利用科学中发展最快的前沿之一--合成生物学--来解决最紧迫的工程问题之一--淡水的供应和修复，以便将创新技术引入迅速扩大的国际市场。合成生物学是一项令人兴奋的、具有潜在变革性的科学事业，显然具有无限的应用前景。这项基础技术目前正在英国各地的实验室进行开发，并产生了重大的学术影响。该领域的前沿正在迅速后退，扩展到现实世界的应用程序现在带来了巨大的挑战和机遇。在这方面，供水和处理技术的设计是一个迫切需要合成生物学承诺的创新的领域。在发达国家，工业革命的工程师给我们留下了宏伟的水利基础设施。但它现在陈旧、有缺陷、维护成本高、运行成本高、耗能大，因此不可持续。我们将在合成生物学基础技术方面进行创新，围绕两个共性主题，即作为哨兵和信号的合成生物和作为催化剂的合成生物，改进和创造新的供水和处理生物技术。环境工程小组目前正在开发的饮用水系统中的芯片到实验室规模的水工程技术、膜过滤技术、厌氧消化、微生物燃料电池和生物电化学系统将提供强大的环境来测试新想法。我们将使用合成生物作为哨兵和信号，以控制生物膜的形成和溶解，并优化废水厌氧处理中有价值的产品的回收。我们将开发最小的细胞结构作为解毒水中的催化剂。我们将量化开放微生物群落中合成生物体的种群动态，探索合成生物学的负责任创新和新兴技术的治理。

We propose to harness one of the most rapidly evolving frontiers in science, synthetic biology, to tackle one of the most pressing engineering problems, the supply and remediation of fresh water, in order to deliver innovative technologies into a rapidly expanding international market.Synthetic biology is an exciting and potentially transformative scientific endeavour with apparently limitless applications. This basic technology is now being developed in laboratories across the UK, with significant academic impact . The frontiers of the field are being pushed back rapidly and scaling up to real-world applications now presents a significant challenge and opportunity. In this respect, the design of technology for water supply and treatment is an area that urgently requires the innovation that synthetic biology promises. In the Developed World, the engineers of the industrial revolution bequeathed us magnificent water infrastructure. But it is now aged, faulty, expensive to maintain, costly to run, energy guzzling and, consequently, unsustainable. We will innovate in the basic-technology of synthetic biology to improve existing and create new biotechnologies for water supply and treatment focussing on two generic themes, namely: synthetic organisms as sentinels and signallers, and synthetic organisms as catalysts.The chip-to-lab-to-pilot scale water engineering technologies in drinking water systems, membrane filtration technologies, anaerobic digestion, microbial fuel cells and bioelectrochemical systems currently being developed in the Environmental Engineering group will provide robust environments to test new ideas. We will use synthetic organisms as sentinels and signallers to engineer the formation and dissolution of biofilms and to optimise the recovery of valuable products in the anaerobic treatment of wastewater. We will develop minimal cell architectures as catalysts in detoxifying water. We will quantify the dynamics of populations of synthetic organisms in open microbial communities and explore responsible innovation in synthetic biology and governance of the emerging technologies.